The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) reportedly plans to be a marketplace for non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and even have an NYSE-branded cryptocurrency, per a Bloomberg report.
The NYSE is believed to have filed trademark application with the US Patent and Trademark Office on February 10, expressing its intention of becoming a financial exchange for crypto trading just like it does for stocks. Its NFT marketplace will compete with existing exchanges such as OpenSea and Rarible, the report said.
The NYSE is the largest global stock exchange in terms of market capitalisation with daily trading volumes estimated to be in the range of hundreds of billions of dollars.
In a statement, the NYSE said it has no immediate plans to launch cryptocurrency or NFT trading but “regularly considers new products and their impact on our trademarks and protects our intellectual property rights accordingly.”
In April 2021, the NYSE had also minted six commemorative tokens as a part of its ‘First Trade’ series, which was released to honour its major public listings. The NFT collection featured Spotify, Snowflake, Unity, Doordash, Roblox, and Coupang.
On its official website, the exchange had said there are “many more NYSE NFTs to come as we continue to welcome new, innovative companies to our community.” This application indicates plans to launch an NFT marketplace for buyers, sellers and traders of “digital assets, artwork, collectibles, and nonfungible tokens.”
However, unlike the NFT launch from last year, the current move signals a much bigger investment in blockchain technology. While the exact details are still unclear, it is certain that a fully functional marketplace is being created.
Crypto exchange Coinbase is also just weeks away from having its own NFT marketplace. And LooksRare is also on an aggressive growth trajectory and was recently in the news. The fact that these are just two prominent names out of many such platforms indicates the untapped potential that exists in the field of blockchain technologies and NFTs.